Random Music Theme 4: I Fought The Law

[vastar iner]

OK. Not sure how this one will come across, as it gets a bit technical, but it might be of some interest. Muhammad Ali was once asked for the best advice he could give to young boxers and it was (a) get a good accountant and (b) get a good lawyer. The very same advice could be applied to many in the music industry – very, very often musicians get themselves involved in legal scrapes. And though those sorts that the likes of Gadd, Doherty and Panayiatou are fairly famous, there are lots of others that bubble on in the background. This is a look at some of those.



Huey Lewis & The News vs Ray Parker Jr

Have a listen to it. What words do you find yourself singing?

Hugh Cregg was nicknamed Huey Louie as a child, so adopted a slight variation as a nom de disque when he joined jazz/funk band Clover (most notable for backing Elvis Costello on “My Aim Is True”). After Clover broke up he formed Huey Lewis & The American Express with some former bandmates, and after a complaint from the credit card company changed their name to Huey Lewis & The News. Lewis and ex-Clover producer Mutt Lange wrote “Do You Believe In Love” and had a top ten US hit with it in 1982; it started the band on their way to success. One of the first American bands to perceive the advantage of the video, they received heavy MTV airplay that cemented their position near the top of the charts.

The second single from their first number one album, “I Want A New Drug”, fit the pattern. Lewis apparently wrote it while going to see his lawyer. How apt. Because six months after it reached number six in the States, early in 1984, the “Ghostbusters” theme was released. Lewis went to see his lawyer again.

Ray Parker Jr wasn’t really known for that sort of bluesy pop; he had started off with Barry White’s Love Unlimited Orchestra, and then formed R&B group Raydio, with a good deal of mainstream success (a handful of top tens). But he was known as a session guitarist and staff songwriter as well as a star in his own right, and when the producers of a little spin-off comedy needed a theme they approached him. He had very little time to write it, and in the middle of the night, staring at television with writer’s block, he was inspired by the cheapo midnight adverts for local services. Unfortunately he seemed to have been a little too inspired by the Huey Lewis song to go with it; and Lewis sued for plagiarism.

The case was settled in 1985, apparently in Lewis’ favour, in more ways than one. The sound was so close that Huey Lewis found himself engaged to do the soundtrack for Back To The Future, giving him his first US number one.

There was a follow-up though. As part of the settlement both Lewis and Parker Jr signed a confidentiality clause. In 2001, when discussing the case as part of a VH1 special, Lewis mentioned the settlement, so Parker Jr decided to take revenge; he sued Lewis for breach of contract – neither side was meant to mention it ever again. The case is apparently still ongoing, although any damage suffered is non-existent.

Plagiarism of songs is not exactly uncommon; George Harrison was sued for copying “He’s So Fine” in “My Sweet Lord”, although as the Chiffons’ song was not a hit in the UK any influence seems to have been subliminal. More recently The Stranglers got thirty grand from the Manic Street Preachers over “If You Tolerate This…” taking a key riff from “Duchess” and of course Oasis are serial offenders. It’s a well-known principle and if it turns out that there is some influence normally the thing gets settled quite amicably, maybe with a credit being given. More controversial is if the arrangement is copied…

[vastar iner]

Double You v KWS

Before we get into this, time for a bit of law (sorry). Why is copying songs unlawful? Because of a concept called intellectual property. There never used to be any such thing. If you came up with an idea, anyone could copy it. There’s the story of a Greek courtesan who sued someone for boasting of having dreamed he slept with her. She said he should pay her – he got the pleasure thanks to her assets. The first intellectual property case. She won Sort of; the judge ordered that as the man had slept with the shadow of her, he should pay her with the shadow of damages.

It meant that authors in ye olden times suffered. You wouldn’t get royalties for your writings. The best you could do is find a sponsor who would pay you to write for them. E.g. the poet laureate who had the ultimate sponsor. Or you could give readings, or even signed editions (the Romans had these).

It was much later, in the fourteenth century, that the idea that inventors should be rewarded for their work came about. For sound economic reasons; why invest hard-earned groats when you would get no benefit? By the eighteenth century this principle extended to writing. And, by analogy, music. Back then it was the printed music that people would copy illicitly; by the twentieth it was recorded music. A bootleg recording was an obvious ripping off. Making a soundalike recording…less obvious. How do you prove that you have copied? It might be that, given a published song, you happen to come along with the idea to record it with kazoos independently of the Kazoo Orchestra.

The Double You and KWS case is a good example of how these things are dealt with. The original song was by disco conglomerate KC And The Sunshine Band, although it was quite different from Wayne Casey’s usual hi-NRG disco-pop; quite slow, almost a ballad. So Italian producer Roberto Zanetti, aka Double You, came up with the idea – 15 years later, in January 1992 – to copy it in a more housey style. It became a hit in Italy; Zanetti ended up selling the rights to his version to ZYX Music to market it across Europe. Network Records negotiated with ZYX to buy the rights to release it in Britain. No deal was possible.

So Network cheated. As ZYX Music had no intention to release it in Britain until summer 1993, Network simply contracted with the dance duo B-Line to record a soundalike version; the two added a local vocalist, re-named themselves KWS after their initials, and spent five weeks at number one with it; Double You’s rush-released version didn’t make the top forty. There was a serious amount of money at stake, estimated at £700,000, so ZYX Music decided to sue Network for infringement of their copyright. The copyright in the arrangement.

To prove it, ZYX called on a musical expert to analyse the arrangements. So did Network to refute the claims. Unfortunately for Network, their expert agreed with ZYX’s expert. He said that “there are a number of very minor details different between this version of Please Don't Go and the version by Double You. But in essence these two versions are the same.” Collapse of stout party.

Pretty much the only defence Network had after that was to make technical points about the permission granted to Double You to cover the KC song; i.e. that Double You had breached copyright and so couldn’t complain if anyone else did. It didn’t work – although EMI seemed to be the owner of the rights to “Please Don’t Go”, EMI knew about it and had made no attempt to stop its release. It had pretty much consented. Not only did the Court award ZYX damages, it got an injunction – a Court order stopping Network, on pain of imprisonment, from ever releasing the KWS song ever again…

Not the first time incidentally that such arrangement copying has happened - Madness sued HSBC for their ripping off of their ska treatment of "It Must Be Love", and you may remember this song, but which was a hit in Britain for someone else...

[suedehead]

Plenty of scope for this topic. Procul Harum, Paul Hardcastle / Mike Oldfield, The Verve / The Stones. Or even Vampire Weekend's ongoing dispute over the picture used on Contra.

[borneoman]

and Gary Barlow stealing Patience off Nerina Pallot

[Earl Purple]

Jan 16, 2011 15:57:21 GMT 1 borneoman said:

and Gary Barlow stealing Patience off Nerina Pallot

minor similarites but different enough. Unless you're referring to a Nerina Pallot song I'm not aware of rather than the one with the same title.

[Earl Purple]

Not sure about The Verve / The Stones being the issue. The Stones clearly got what was due, as did HW Casey with the KWS one. KWS were covering a KC & The Sunshine Band song and no doubt gave them royalties, but were sued by another artist who did a cover with the same arrangement, over use of their arrangement.

With The Verve they borrowed another arrangement of "The Last Time" and used it in their song, so the question would be whether they have to pay for the arrangement they used or just pay to the original writer. I seem to recall reading that only Jagger/Richards got any royalties.

The same would apply to this one:


This is song from 1979. Surely you can work out this song blatantly rips off a big hit from the previous year, except that the artist that had the big hit with it was not the original artist. Did they pay any royalties and if so, who to?

[vastar iner]

The Verve one was complicated because Andrew Loog Oldham claimed the rights to the arrangement of "The Last Time", he was paid off, and then Allen Klein's label claimed IT had bought the rights from Oldham, and also needed to be paid...

That's quite a famous one, though, I'll generally be looking at a few of the more forgotten ones. And ones that usually went to a full trial. Easier to get a proper result from those.

[Earl Purple]

You mentioned George Harrison but the Jam clearly ripped off one of his compositions for the Beatles and I'm not sure if they ever offered any settlement for that. I know Billy Bragg offered to Paul Simon for the "21 years" line which came from a Simon & Garfunkel song but he didn't want to accept the payment.

[vastar iner]

I've always thought the opening to "In The City" by The Jam was pretty much the same as "Holidays In The Sun"...could never find if there was any claim regarding that.

[Robin]

I'm pretty sure the Thrills had to fork out heavily for the use of the line "hey hey we're the Monkees' in the song "Big Sur". They later stated that they regretted ever using it!!!!

[Earl Purple]

Carter USM had to pay Jagger/Richards for using the "Goodbye Ruby Tuesday" line in "After The Watershed".

[suedehead]

Jan 18, 2011 2:19:46 GMT 1 Earl Purple said:

Carter USM had to pay Jagger/Richards for using the "Goodbye Ruby Tuesday" line in "After The Watershed".

At least James didn't sue for the first two words of the next line

[vastar iner]

So, we don't like people who steal credit, do we?



Frankie Lymon & The Teenagers

A very sad one, this. But not untypical of what went on in the fifties – and what still goes on today. You might see that Elvis Presley is credited as the author of many of his songs. I don’t think he wrote a song in his life. But that was the price Col. Tom Parker extorted from the genuine songwriters; give Elvis part of the credit, so he gets a share of the songwriter royalty. And the Colonel could get his 15%. Or more.

It has taken a long time to remedy many of these injustices. And a paramount example is that suffered by the Teenagers. Just another doo-wop group that emerged in the fifties? Not quite – they were the Musical Youth (or, given they were American, the New Edition) of their day. All still at school when two of their members Herman Santiago and Jimmy Merchant wrote a little ditty that they performed with their friends under the name The Coupe De Villes. Needing more of a soprano voice, one of their fans, Frankie Lymon, was recruited. He re-wrote part of the song that would become “Why Do Fools Fall In Love?” and took the lead on an audition for Gee Records; George Goldner in place of the flu-ridden Santiago. The audition was successful; the group signed up. There were a couple of problems. Firstly, the emphasis soon fell on Lymon, to the disgust of the group, and Lymon was pulled out by Gee to go solo. Secondly, Goldner stole the credit from Merchant and Santiago. It took until 1992 for Santiago and Merchant to get the credit they deserved; and as a result they became millionaires overnight.

Goldner had gone so far as to sell his “half” of the credit to Morris Levy, of Roulette Records. Levy was even more notorious for stealing songwriter credit, backed up by some rather well-connected friends of his, and when he wanted to sign an act, competing labels were sort of persuaded to give way; Tommy James claims he never received one red cent from Roulette Records. Levy was indicted for trial in 1985 for fraud when he conveniently died.

The sadness though comes from the fate of the Teenagers. Santiago and Merchant still perform. Two other members suffered early deaths. And Lymon himself? When his voice broke he tried continuing as a falsetto (“Little Bitty Pretty One”). Didn’t work. The 15 year old Lymon got mixed up with the seedier side of the industry and became a heroin addict. His career and personal life went on a downward spiral, only sorted when he was drafted into the US Army. And that proved temporary. He went AWOL to get married, and was dishonourably discharged; however Levy’s Roulette Records suggested that he would be interested in recording the now 25 year old Lydon. Frankie celebrated with a bit of heroin. It killed him.

[Earl Purple]

According to wikipedia, Santiago and Merchant lost their claim on appeal based on the fact that there was a 3-year time limit to claim on copyright and they hadn't done so.

[vastar iner]

Yeah, I'm not sure that's correct as I couldn't find any reference. Plus limitation does not apply to claims based on fraud. In any event, it would not affect a claim for ongoing royalties.

[borneoman]

and yes, I mean Nerina's 2001 song Patience. Maybe I'm biased cos I'm a big Nerina fan, but the melody in the chorus is similar-ish and even the lyrics too, not saying he stole it but porbably got inspired by it

[andrew07]

I believe Anastacia's hit Cowboys & Kisses is a direct rip-off of Lucky Man by The Verve; same intro, same chord progession throughout. Why hasn't Richard Ashcroft been credited for this?

[Earl Purple]

I am very familiar with the Nerina Pallot song, it reached #1 in my chart for 3 weeks, was the song that was #1 on 11 September 2001...

[borneoman]

^and do you see the similarities I'm talking about?

[Earl Purple]

Very slight. If it weren't for the titles being the same I'm not sure if we'd have even considered the songs sounding similar.

Has anyone noticed what song Desire Me is a blatant copy of?